5 steps to improve your photography sales
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Visit art galleries and art fairs
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Have many Instagram followers
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Put your work on Flickr and 500px
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Build your own stock site
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Workshops
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It takes a certain amount of effort to move up from amateur to an enthusiast who earns money with photography, and eventually to pro. Not only does it take hard work, you also have to know what you’re doing. Sometimes things go natural, other times it takes a little more than that. Here are 5 steps to boost your photography sales and get new clients.
It often takes a step back in order to see well. Put your camera down for a while and go visit photography exhibitions and art shows. You can’t lose in any way by taking this step. First of all, you have a good chance of getting inspired. You might come up with new ideas and extend your portfolio. Second, you will get a clear idea of “what’s hot”. The art market is pretty much like any other market, it has it trends and fashions that change every few years. Next, it you might find the opportunity to talk to gallery owners and curators, and you never know when something like that could lead to a pitch.
Social networks are very powerful tools for promoting yourself. While Facebook can be great for weddings and portraits, Instagram is a great place to share everything else you like to photograph, and what you wouldn’t normally expect to be paid for. By building a solid following, you are massively increasing your chances of getting noticed by the right people from the art world and advertising agencies.
Luckily, Flickr has been rehabilitating itself quite well, along with all of Yahoo. It has actually become useful and user friendly again. It doesn’t have the impact it used to have when it was the only photography sharing platform available on the web, but it still is the place to be if you want to get noticed. I’ve had clients contact me through Flickr out of thin air.
500px is also a good option. It has a higher quality level and it is a very nice place to make your photos shine.
Don’t freak out just yet. There are plenty of templates available online, even for stock galleries, so building the website shouldn’t be very hard. On the other hand, if you work constantly, just as you would for a large agency, you have a better chance of finding your own clients and making them regulars.
A good workshop can speed up your evolution and boost your sales. Good education has always had a powerful contribution in learning how to sell yourself as a photographer and how to sell your work. A qualified trainer will save you months, even years of trial and error and explain exactly how you should market yourself and your work.
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